lot of early Famicom shooters aren't exactly the most noteworthy entries in STG history. But what's this? A basic shooter with real-time strategy elements? By Will Wright?! Oh, and a weird name. I guess it's time to check out Raid on Bungeling Bay! How does it stack up?

empest 2000 is a pretty great time, but it's time for a new version of Tempest for a new generation. Rather than having a Tempest clone on the PS4, Atari instead chose to have the devs behind Txk, Llamasoft, work on an official Tempest game instead. The result is Tempest 4000... but how does it stack up?

e enjoyed Gunbird for Nintendo Switch, so when ZeroDiv brought Gunbird 2 to the platform, it was only natural that we had to take a look! Adding new elements to established formula, Gunbird 2 is a game that is better in every way than its direct predecessor... but how does it stack up?

1917: The Alien Invasion was a decent fictional account of WWI humanity versus an invading alien scourge. Now it's back with extra ships, levels and features as 1917: The Alien Invasion DX for the Nintendo Switch and PC... with what could be an inappropriate ESRB rating. What are we talking about? Let's take a closer look.

So you want a shmup for four players in the vein of star soldier and other caravan shmups? Quad Fighter K answers the call, complete with a faux kusoge in tow. So how does this indie Japanese caravan shmup stack up? Let's take a look!

pon first hearing of Uppercut Games’ first-person title, City of Brass, I was intrigued as to what Bioshock veterans could bring to the roguelite genre. Add that to the part of me that is desperately awaiting a new Prince of Persia title, and you can understand why I was pretty excited. After getting my hands on it, I wasn’t disappointed; at least, not completely.

City of Brass heavily pulls from the Arabian Nights stylizations. It’s very apparent even in the title’s logo that this game is set in the dark ages of the Middle East, and brings all the mystical Persian Empire-esque wonder with it. Desert sands, scimitars, magic genies, and booby-trapped treasures litter the title in the best ways possible.

hat was once a niche sub-genre that was only romanticized by its rabid cult-following, has now gradually begun to spill into the mainstream of the independent video game scene—Metroidvania games are available on just about every system at this point, to the point where the style is bordering on stagnation.

In an intriguing twist, however, similar to the Nuzlocke challenges that have swept numerous play-throughs of the Pokémon series, the iconic games that pioneered the formula, like Super Metroid, and Castlevania Aria of Sorrow, are now getting modded with the “randomizer” treatment. This modification works to alter the order and location of key upgrades and items in their core game, forcing an entirely new Meta into the gameplay for players to tackle.

One developer by the name of Matt Bittner took notice of the trend, and took it upon himself to push the concept to an entirely different level; developing a Metroidvania adventure that would not only randomize items, upgrades, but the map layout itself, in a manner that’s similar to roguelike dungeon crawler titles. His efforts led to producing an ambitious pixelated tribute to the genre called A Robot Named Fight, releasing for Steam and Nintendo Switch, and while the release does make good on its premise, its execution leaves a lot to be desired.